With the expansion of wireless communication and the development of wireless personal communications services, more people are using wireless communications devices as their primary telephone for both personal and business use. As such wireless usage expands, it is increasingly important to provide wireless customers with the same types of features available to line-based home and business telephone customers. One feature that is not available to wireless users is having multiple directory numbers terminate to the same telephone.
Most businesses, and many homes, have multiple directory numbers (DNs) that terminate at the telephones in the location. In these systems, each DN is associated with a line (a pair of wires) that physically come into the premises. Generally, a line-based system automatically identifies which of the multiple lines is ringing. In a business, a multibutton keyset shows the user which line is ringing by lighting a button ("key") associated with the tinging line. In a residential setting, each line has its own bell that the user can audibly identify. While it is theoretically possible to have a wireless communications device with several telephone numbers, it is currently not possible to distinguish which one is tinging.
Additionally, business customers frequently use a "call pickup" feature. Call pickup is simply answering a ringing telephone from another phone. Call pickup is practical in offices that have several telephones physically located near each other, so that the ringing telephone can be heard. A person who hears the ringing phone can enter a code into a second phone and the call is transferred to the second phone. This is not possible in current wireless systems, as call pickup is not available. When wireless phones are not physically co-located, there is no means of alerting a person to the fact that another phone is tinging.
Accordingly, a need exists in the art to provide a user of wireless telephone equipment that has a plurality of DNs a means to identify which DN is being called, and a need exists to alert multiple phones (that share DNs with other phones) so that a call can be picked up and inform the users which phone is ringing.